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Some Tips for Working with Vinyl
Some Tips for Working with Vinyl
If you're a visual learner, there are some youtube videos below. Youtube has a ton of great tutorials out there.
Use big and chunky shapes and fonts. The tinier the details and the finer the lines, the harder it will be to work with.
If you're working with iron-on, make sure you flip or mirror the text and images. Because you flip it over, it will come out backwards if you don't!
Use the rulers on the mats (the green cutting boards, see the picture to the left). These are pretty handy and will help you measure out the sizes you want. You can also use little bits left over easily.
Take your time! You might miss a piece or mess something up if you rush. Especially if you're getting started. We've made plenty of mistakes with our projects!
Be patient. You'll make mistakes. That's okay. You'll learn.
Weeding
Weeding
You need to clear out all the excess vinyl that you don't want. This is called weeding. Crazy, huh? We have a series of tools to help with this; the "dental pick" is particularly helpful for this part of the project.
Be careful and take your time--especially if you have some fine details cut out. Watch out for the small letters too--little dots over the eye "i" and even the "i" itself can get pulled away.
Make sure you get all the little dots in letters--like in "a" and "o" and "e" and even "p" and "d"! Those will sneak in there, so look carefully!
Working with Iron-On Vinyl
Working with Iron-On Vinyl
When putting your iron-on material on your mat, make sure the shiny side is down and the matte side is up. There's a clear plastic layer--don't cut the clear plastic.
Double check that you flipped your text and images.
Make sure you have the material dial set correctly. If you don't you may need to cut again, wasting that sheet.
Then cut away!
You've cut and weeded your iron on material. What next?
I like to give a little pre-iron to my tshirt or whatever. Warms things up a bit and gets out any wrinkles.
Slap down your vinyl. Make sure the shiny side is up this time. The clear plastic will be peeled away.
Place some parchment paper (like you use for cooking or baking) over the fabric and iron-on material. Iron on the parchment paper. It's not really needed, but it won't burn your fabric. Parchment paper makes a great barrier--the vinyl could stick to the iron, but it won't stick to the parchment paper! Handy stuff.
Iron for 30 second to 1 minute.
Some vinyls like to have the clear plastic peeled when hot; others when cold. If the clear plastic doesn't peel away easily, then wait until it's cooled.
After you have peeled the clear plastic away, you can slap the parchment paper down again, and give it another ironing, if you feel like you want to make sure it's solidly on there.
If you want multiple colors, you can iron another color over the first layer you put down.
It's recommended that you turn the clothing inside out for washing, but I don't find that necessary.
You can always re-iron the material at any time. Make sure you use the parchment paper so the vinyl doesn't stick to the iron!
Working with Vinyl as Stickers
Working with Vinyl as Stickers
You can work with temporary and permanent vinyl in the same way. Just remember that one peels off easily, the other doesn't; one will leave little residue, the other may tear off giant chunks of dry wall. So choose wisely.
Place the vinyl on the mat so that the white side is down and the color side is up. Makes sense, right?
Make sure that the Cricut material dial is set to cut vinyl. If you don't it'll cut the backing as well. That gets problematic, and you'll need to cut again, wasting that sheet.
Then cut away!
It's been cut, now what?
As you weed it, you should have the remaining color material on a slippery white backpaper, like a sticker.
Use some transfer material (usually clear, with a blue grid) or some high quality painter's tape to transfer the sticker. Place the sticky side down and rub it vigorously. You can get a special tool for this, or you can use a credit card or ID. That works well. This is meant to grab the non-sticky side of the vinyl so you can peel it off the white backing. Instead of peeling letter by letter, trying to get them placed just right, this method will let you place everything at once.
Once you have all your sticker material stuck to the transfer material (it doesn't always want to be pulled from the backing, so be careful!), then place the the transfer paper to the surface you want the sticker on.
Using that credit card or ID or whatever, rub the transfer material vigorously. This will adhere the stickers to the surface. Because the transfer material isn't as adhesive as the stickers, it will stick to the surface as you peel away the transfer paper. But be careful--you really need to rub vigorously!
Watch out for bubbling too!
Here's a strip that has already been weeding. See how it would be tricky to get those letters from the backing to your surface? The transfer paper, shown, is is placed over it. Rub that vigorous to make sure it applies well.
Now we place the transfer paper and vinyl on your surface. See how we don't need to place every little letter? Smash that sticker on there really well! Then peel away the transfer paper. Some painters tape works well too, but some are too sticky and don't want to release the vinyl.
Notice how we're ironing with the parchment paper. This stuff really is excellent to work with!
We have an iron and an ironing mat, bundled up in a box ready to go! Working with a class? Feel free to take these supplies! (Just bring them back--okay?)
Here's a tutorial from Cricut. This one helped me figure this out. Rather unfortunate thumbnail though.
Another tutorial from Cricut. This one will help with the vinyl as explained above.
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